Rodeo, Fort Worth, Texas — photograph © 2015 Langdon Clay.

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. . . by Jae Song.

In Big Bend National Park, Texas.

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. . . by Jae Song.

View from outside our motel rooms, Marfa, Texas, Christmas — the edge of the prairie.

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. . . by Jae Song.

We saw this object in the sky from some distance away on the road to Marfa.  At first I thought it was a small airplane until I realized it wasn’t moving.  Then I thought it might be a hot-air balloon, except that those are usually brightly colored.

As we got closer we realized it was some sort of tethered dirigible, which seemed to be in the shape of a dolphin.  As we passed it, it no longer looked like a marine mammal — just a miniature airship with a small enclosed gondola beneath it.

Since we were near Mexico, we concluded that it contained equipment for monitoring illegal border crossings — but who knows?

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[See the comments for the solution to the mystery . . .]

. . . by Jae Song.

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